National day of reason celebration

In 1952, during the McCarthy era, the U.S. Congress established the National Day of Prayer. According to the statute signed by President Harry S. Truman, “The President shall issue each year a proclamation designating the first Thursday in May as a National Day of Prayer on which the people of the United States may turn to God in prayer and meditation at churches, in groups, and as individuals.”

Since that law was enacted, all U.S. presidents have performed that duty. And prior to that, national prayer observances had been declared at various times for various dates by nearly all our presidents. A notable exception was Thomas Jefferson — whose Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom was the precursor of the establishment clause of the First Amendment.

For those of us prone to forget (including, apparently, our McCarthy-era congressmen — who later added the words “under God” to the Pledge of Allegiance), the establishment clause reads: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

To the non-religious who pretend to pray at community Thanksgiving dinners so as not to offend the sensibilities of those who think everyone is (or ought to be) a Christian, or who repeat or pretend to repeat the words “under God” while reciting the Pledge of Allegiance at local government meetings so as not to be treated as a pariah, the National Day of Prayer might seem innocuous enough. But it isn’t.

The National Day of Prayer is an exclusionary act that needlessly divides America. It separates from the mainstream good American non-believers, others from minority faiths (including polytheists such as Hindus), and the religious who don’t concur with the concept of government-mandated prayer.

In 2003, the American Humanist Association and the Washington Area Secular Humanists launched a website for the National Day of Reason, also to be held on the first Thursday in May. Its  purpose is “to celebrate reason — a concept all Americans can support — and to raise public awareness about the persistent threat to religious liberty posed by government intrusion into the private sphere of worship,” and to inspire the secular community to be more visible.

The National Day of Reason acknowledges the role of reason in everyday life, and the positive effects its application has had on humankind — whether in developing new technologies or guiding good public policy. Science and reason, not prayer, discovered vaccines for small pox and polio, put satellites in the sky and men on the moon, and has improved the extent of human knowledge and the quality of human life exponentially since we first stood upright.

Article VI, paragraph 3, of the U.S. Constitution, says that, “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.” Yet as the 2016 presidential campaign unfolds, we anticipate the spectacle of politician after politician parading their faith before us.

For those politicians who are constantly trying to prove how Christian they are; for those who confuse public expressions of faith with patriotism, competence and good intentions; for those who think the National Day of Prayer actually promotes religious freedom instead of monopolizing it for Judeo-Christians; and for those otherwise credulous enough to buy into this malarkey, I quote Matthew Chapter 6, verses 5-6: “[When] you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others. ... But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.”

My organization, the Flathead Area Secular Humanist Association, will have its own National Day of Reason Celebration, at 5:30 to 9 p.m., Tuesday, May 5, at the Museum at Central School in Kalispell. The public is invited to help us celebrate what the human mind can achieve without the impediments of faith and prayer. We’ll have the presentations “Science: Its Means, Purpose and Value” and “The Fifteen Commandments,” followed by a potluck (finger food) social hour with a cash bar. Admission will be free.

Richard E. Wackrow, of Whitefish and Polebridge, is administrator of the Flathead Area Secular Humanist Association.